Currently, a large number of food products or items are packaged in a manner that enables the food products to be easily transported and/or consumed. While the majority of these types of packaging allow for the food product to be easily held within the container until it is desired to consume the food product, some of these containers do not provide the ability to heat or cool the food product as desired prior to consuming it.
Thus, in order to enable the container to heat the product or cool the food product as desired prior to consumption, a number of different heating and cooling mechanisms have been developed for use with containers of this type. One of the more economical ways used to heat or cool a food product within the container holding the food product is a chemical heating or cooling pack disposed in the container in direct contact with the food product to be heated or cooled. The chemical pack includes a number of chemical reagents contained within separated compartments of the pack that can be ruptured to allow the reagents to mix. When the reagents in the chemical pack are mixed, the resulting reaction functions to supply or remove heat energy, thereby heating or cooling the food product held within the container in contact with the chemical pack.
However, when chemical packs of this type are utilized, significant problems with the heating or cooling of the food product in the container are still encountered. For example, the chemical pack positioned within the container is often not located in an optimal location for effectively heating or cooling the entire food product. In most containers of this type, the chemical pack is located on one side of the container and/or is secured to the container completely around the periphery of the pack. In these configurations, the food product to be warmed or cooled does not contact the chemical pack around the entire pack, resulting in a significant amount of heating or cooling energy generated by the pack that does not come into contact with the food product.
Further, in order to enable an individual to place a food product into, or remove the product from the container, an opening is formed in the container. However, in most containers, the opening is large enough for the individual to reach into the interior of the container and come into direct contact with the chemical pack, potentially injuring the individual. Also, because the chemicals used as the reactants in the chemical pack could be harmful if ingested by an individual, should one or more of the components of the pack rupture, the reagents can mix with the food product without any indication that this has occurred. Further, depending upon the particular reagents utilized and the structure of the chemical pack in which the reagents are contained, if the reactants leak in small amounts into contact with one another prior to activation of the pack, a runaway reaction may occur in which the desired temperature for the reaction is greatly exceeded, such that the reaction can damage or completely burn through the container holding the food product.
As a result, it is desirable to develop a self-heating or self-cooling food product package or pouch that avoids these deficiencies present in prior art self-heating and self-cooling containers.